It's Not Forever, It's Just Tonight
by inkfiction
Summary: It is a moment in time, like a drop in the ocean, a brick in the wall. Something that in itself doesn't mean anything — it is a part of the whole. The next day you will be the cold, hard Mayor, and she will be — whatever she is. A scene from 'Desperate Souls'.


**Title:** it's not forever, it's just tonight  
**Fandom:** Once Upon a Time  
**Pairing:** Swan Queen (Emma Swan/Regina Mills)  
**Spoilers/Warning:** Not really unless you haven't watched Desperate Souls.  
**Summary:** It is a moment in time, like a drop in the ocean, a brick in the wall. Something that in itself doesn't mean anything — it is a part of the whole. The next day you will be the cold, hard Mayor, and she will be — whatever she is.  
**Disclaimers:** This is purely fictional. I own none of it.

[…]

_A/N: Title from Kings of Leon's __**Sex on Fire**__. Totally Beanz's fault, who made me watch the video of the said song while I had this gif from the fire scene open in one of the tabs__._

_2. This is a sad attempt at writing smut. I've been working on this for ages. I mean, I started it in March, for God's sake! It just never seems right, it feels like something is missing. But I'm tired of it now and I think it's time to give up. It is probably the fact that I am quite incapable of writing smut. This is the most smutty I can get (which isn't much at all — the M rating is really just meant to make me feel better :/). I'm more of a hints and feelings kind of person._

_Your feedback will be appreciated, as always._

[…]

She comes to you, you go to her, it really doesn't matter, no. It makes no difference it was in her cramped Bug, or on your king-sized bed. It really doesn't.

It is a moment in time, like a drop in the ocean, a brick in the wall. Something that in itself doesn't mean anything — it is a part of the whole. The next day you will be the cold, hard Mayor, and she will be — whatever she is. Next day you will go back to your routine and she will stand in front of a hall full of townspeople and try her best to flout your authority while you sit amongst the masses and try to sabotage her every move. Next day it will be business as usual. Backlash, sarcasm, plotting, scathing come backs: your bread and butter.

But right now, in this moment, it doesn't really matter what you were, what you will be again. Right now you're nothing but this moment.

And this moment is the affirmation of life you so desperately need, because back there in the midst of the flames where you eyed death so closely, you had seen the end coming. Back there when she left you and you were sure she wasn't going to come back for you — why would she, when had anyone ever? — and you thought this was how it was going to end, the life built and perfected in twenty-eight years ending here, abruptly. But she came back and it didn't end there and you didn't die and now here you are, in this moment, trying to tell yourself, reassure yourself that it didn't end, that you are alive, both of you, that in this moment she needs you just as much as you need her.

This moment is the assertion of that fact. It is the gratefulness you feel towards her for saving your life and the anger and resentment that burns in your heart that you needed her at all. It is smoky kisses and the taste of ash in your mouth. It is the stench of scorched pleather in your nose and the burn of charcoal dust which clings to the walls of your throat and makes you rasp. It is the feeling of burnt, knotted, little holes in the expensive purple silk of your shirt as your fingers entwine with her hands wandering over your torso. It is the singed ends of blond hair that dance at the edge of your vision as it blurs from the confluence of all that you're feeling.

This moment is hastily discarded jackets and the scrape of your cold, silver belt-buckle on your bare midriff which makes you shiver. It is ripped underclothes steeped in the smell of smoke. Smoke in her hair, in yours, on both your skins. This moment is your body on fire, lit inside out, under her blistered fingertips and eager, urgent lips. This moment is your brain, your thoughts, your very being combusting as she takes you, owns you.

You burn, you melt, you turn to ash, turn to molten flames in her arms. She's fire and smoke, and she covers you, smothers your lungs, seeps through the very pores in your skin, dissolves in your blood and settles into your very being.

This moment is your mouth on her salty, ash-covered skin, the love bite down her neck, and hot, searing, open-mouthed kisses and swirling circles of bite-marks that won't fade for days. It is your tongue slow dancing on her skin, the tip tracing unknown, intricate patterns. It is your hands splayed on the dip of her abdomen, your nails trailing over her bare skin, moving down.

This moment is your name on her chapped lips and the way the three simple syllables burn into your soul like hot coals and settle somewhere in deep knots of pleasure and desire as it drops from her lips like a plea, like a prayer, like a mantra, like a life-line.

This moment is you deep inside her, your mouth hot on her sweaty pulse point, her smoke smudged collar bone grating against your teeth, her arched back, her tightly closed eyes, her rocking hips, her fingers jerking painfully at your hair with every thrust, her nails leaving stinging, bloodied scratches in between your shoulder blades.

This moment is you losing your tightly furled mantle of control and giving in to sheer abandon. It is your head thrown back as you ride the hand deep in you. It is the primal cry of desire that is ripped from your throat. It is her name, mingled with pleas, requests and highly inappropriate cries to God. This moment is your knuckles white with their grip on her arms, and purple-red bruises blossoming on her pale skin. It is you bent over her, and the dark hair that falls over your face like a curtain, it is the impatient huff as you blow it away to look at her face and the way you immediately look away when your eyes meet hers.

This moment is the pain that blooms deep in you, the ecstasy that over-takes you. It is your undoing, it is hers. It is your fingertips tracing the multitude of tiny scars and blemishes and stretch marks on her body. It is nails scratching down your chest, down hers, and a hot mouth right where it should be. It is the pain in your twisted ankle and the joy that sears through every fiber of your being as you come undone. It is blood crashing through your heart at a hundred miles an hour, it is adrenaline coursing through your body, making your veins sing.

It is the eternity between the gasp of pleasure, the sigh of pain, between a choking sob and a bubbling laugh. It is a hundred little deaths packed tightly in that one fall into oblivion; it is the one moment that spans an eternity, an eternity that maps an instant.

This moment is the aftermath. It is the brand new delightful soreness in your muscles that masks the fatigue of your ordeal by fire. It is your tangled, tired limbs and the pleasant ache that remains somewhere below the pit of your stomach. It is your heart pounding a little slower with every beat as your breathing calms down and the way your body feels so wonderfully slack and loose.

And it is the realization, the knowledge that it is but this moment. The sheer, oppressive weight of the certainty that it can be nothing more, and yet it is the feeling that is new and scary and terrible — that all your moments up till now spring from this point in time, converge to end exactly here, that this moment is what is supposed to _be_ — right and perfect and forever after — and the fact that it is not, will never be, can never be. And you know that, and she knows that, and yet somewhere deep inside the knowledge crushes you.

And this moment is the ache in your heart and her arms around you, and your tears on her bruises. It is her hand on your cheek and her lips on your eyes, it is the sobbing laugh that escapes your mouth to disappear into hers, it is your tongue that tastes the salt of your own tears. It is the dozens of tiny kisses you place on her face, her neck. It is her thumb that strokes your lip, her green eyes looking into your soul, and your heart beating against hers.

This moment is you. It is her. It is the two of you and everything that you are.

It is all that, and more. But it is just a moment. And it will pass. And tomorrow you will be the Mayor, and she — she'll be whatever she is.

_**~fin~**_

_A/N: So. The idea I owe somewhat to __**Scarlett**__ by __**Alexandra Ripley**__ (which — shame on me — I read before reading __**Gone with the Wind**__, and ended up liking. I know, I __**know**__ it's a terrible sequel, but still!) and (SPOILERS!) what transpires between Scarlett and Rhett right after their boat capsizes and they almost drown._

_Thoughts?_


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